---

The Interview:

Karen: Tell me about your current research. 

Hector: I work in the laboratory of Dr. Christopher Clarke in the Stony Brook Cancer Center, where I  was placed through the SOAR program this past summer. My project involved testing the eIicacy of  novel DES1 inhibitors on anchorage-independent survival of breast cancer cells. In collaboration  with a lab in Spain that produced two potent DES1 inhibitors, our lab had 3 major objectives for  testing the viability of these inhibitors: Do the compounds inhibit DES 1? What eIect do the compounds have on sphingolipids? Do the results follow the known biological eIects that occur upon knockout of DES1? 

This was my first research experience, and I really liked how from day one, I was put into doing  experiments, learning new things. The first day, they showed me how to do a Bradford assay, and I  got to start working on the project right away.  

So was the summer research experience overall a positive experience for you?
Yes, very positive. And I’ll be continuing in the lab this fall! 

I was raised in a way to love work, and to always be grateful for it. From a young age, I have had  various work experiences from doing gardening to working in factories that were physically  demanding. But this summer was a new experience of work for me, and I just fell in love with it,  especially doing cell culture. There's no job out there like this, and I really enjoyed the interactions  and relationships with the people in the lab: you're all going through the same struggles in a way,  working together on a project and everybody's so close. Everybody feels like a family, and it was an  amazing experience. I can't wait to continue on forward, working there with the family I've gotten to  know in the lab. 

As someone new to doing research, was there anything that you found particularly surprising  about the work? 

My only previous experience beforehand involved doing classroom-related laboratory experiments,  which would take about 3 hours. So for me, seeing the actual time it takes to carry out any given  experiment you are working on was surprising. We’re talking about something like a minimum of 50  to 75 hours of just prep time before you can even actually start the experiment. It was also mind boggling in a way, being able to work with such complex and expensive equipment.  

How did your mentor help you? 

Dr. Clarke is an amazing mentor. I felt very lucky to be placed in his group. He takes it upon himself to be there every day and check in on how everybody is doing. Anytime that I was confused or had a question, I could just knock on his door, go into his oIice, and he would be willing to sit down and  explain things to me. And that’s a big reason why I want to stay in the lab. 

How has doing hands-on research enhanced your academic education? 

I’ve been in the American education system from middle school through high school. And when you're in a classroom, you just focus on getting the right answer, or getting a hundred on a test. But  once you're in the lab, that's when you get to use all the critical thinking skills that you have learned  for the past 10 years of your life and you actually get to apply your knowledge.  

You learn in the lab that you can’t expect to have one right answer. Because a lot of times, there just isn’t an answer or an easy solution. So you have to be led by what the data tells you. It’s a diIerent  process than learning from the classroom.  

Did you enjoy presenting a poster at the conclusion of the summer program? 

From a young age, I've always been very comfortable with presenting. But what I really was  unfamiliar with was the process of building a poster, figuring out what to include, and how to explain  what I had been doing. I had never really had that experience before…. So it felt somewhat  overwhelming at first. But working with Dr. Clarke and the people in my lab, they really helped me to  become more comfortable with understanding how to go about making the poster, and how to explain the project. And then once I actually got to the Symposium, I felt really proud and amazed  about everything I had done in just over 10 weeks. When you stare at 400 hours of your work, you think: “Wow, I did all that!” It was really amazing. Being able to present it to my family who came,  especially to present to them in Spanish-- that was interesting, too.  

At one point, Dr. Clarke and the graduate student and I were talking together and looking at the  poster in front of us, analyzing the results, and saying: “Okay, why did this happen?” And just that  moment of stepping back and looking at the project, and thinking about what we want to do next, it  was an amazing experience. I definitely want to present again! 

Did you enjoy the SOAR programming workshops? 

Yes, those were useful, especially for someone like me with zero experience in research before. We  had workshops on how to read scientific papers, how to present a poster, and how to apply to  graduate school. I really liked the workshop on how to use AI and how AI can actually help us out in  research…,.and I also really liked the one that with the graduate student panel. I felt that there were  many students there like myself, asking the same questions about future goals: Do I want to pursue a PhD? Should I think about an M.D./Ph.D. program? 

What advice would you give to a student who is about to join a research lab for the first time? 

My first bit of advice would be to write everything down. When you’re in a lab, you’ll find that there  are people who want to help you out but they're also very busy. So if you write down the protocols  and take notes, you'll be able to get yourself to a point where you are more self-sufficient, and  won’t be in the position of asking other graduate students to repeat themselves with showing the same things to you again and again. I definitely would recommend writing it all down. And it’s also a  good idea to write your questions down because this will allow you to understand the material better.

What got you motivated to try research?  

At Suffolk, I belonged to CSTEP and I was really encouraged to pursue opportunities for research – including the SOAR program. But I’ve been interested in research from a young age. I was always known for always asking a lot of questions and being interested in knowing how things work, even at  a young age. I think that is what has carried me forward with research. Being in the lab is a place where you are  encouraged to ask questions, where it’s your job to try to figure out how things work. You can't  always know if you're right, but you can look at what the data is telling you, at what the data suggests and you can go deeper into it. There's always more work to do, more to figure out. And I really like that. 

Is there anything else that you would like to add about your summer research experience? 

SOAR is a great program! There aren’t many programs out there like SOAR that will find you a lab,  pay you to do research, and at the same time provide housing. But it goes beyond that. 

Some of the people I was able to meet within the program are amazing people. Especially for  someone like me who was coming to Stony Brook from the outside, it really gave me a leg up to be able to get involved and meet people and make connections to the campus through the program. I  found a group of friends through the program, and I definitely will be recommending this program to  other people.